Currently known OTC analgesic products for topical uses have many problems. There is a need for an OTC topical pain relieving product that relieves most external acute or chronic pain within a few minutes, providing relief that lasts up to several hours (for uninterrupted sleep and work), and without unpleasant physical and social side effects such as strong odors, counterirritation, redness, itching, stinging, cooling, sensitization, staining, burning, perfumes, anesthesia, etc. Ideally such product would also quickly relieve inflammation, edema, redness, and swelling along with pain, thereby increasing pain free range of motion, even in difficult to treat pain cases, without the patient needing strong topical and oral OTC or prescription drugs with powerful undesirable and unpleasant side effects. Currently, most OTC topical pain relief counterirritant products may not be used as frequently as needed because of six problems listed below.
1. The currently available OTC topical analgesics have limited effectiveness and duration in treating pain.
2. The currently available OTC topical analgesics may have socially embarrassing odors after application because of the strong scent of menthol, wintergreen (methyl salicylate), camphor, or strongly aromatic essential oils, etc.
3. The currently available OTC topical analgesics may contain staining or allergenic artificial dyes (e.g. blue or green) or synthetic perfumes.
4. The oil or fat contents (creams, salves and lotions, etc.) of the currently available OTC topical analgesics, or plant pigments or dyes in the currently available OTC topical analgesics may visibly stain clothing or leave greasy spots, or be allergenic and/or sensitizing to certain individuals.
5. The currently available OTC topical analgesics may contain substances that are irritating, allergenic, sensitizing, or toxic in excess or high concentrations that should not be applied more than 3 or 4 times daily, or are dangerous if ingested. Such products may contain ingredients that produce unpleasant or distracting physical sensations (counterirritants) such as stinging or burning from capsaicin (which may occur for several days), hot or cold sensations from menthol or wintergreen, or the possibility of allergic reaction to salicylate containing aspirin-like products (trolamine salicylate, methyl salicylate).
6. Some currently available homeopathic products are reported to have limited therapeutic indications (e.g. arnica tincture and 1× potency may produce toxic symptoms with open cuts or ingestion); and some higher potency (i.e. more serially diluted) homeopathic products do not appear to have strong or effective topical analgesic or anti-inflammatory properties.
An examination of existing OTC topical pain products in most pharmacies reveals, that although there are many brands to choose from, they all basically use various combinations of the same active ingredients, namely: menthol, methyl salicylate, camphor, and trolamine salicylate which have the drawbacks mentioned above. There is a need of novel formulations having analgesic and/or anti-inflammatory properties that can avoid the drawbacks of the prior art analgesic products. The homeopathic formulations of the present invention fulfill such a need. The formulations of the invention are not counterirritants and do not rely upon massage, heat, stimulation or counterirritation to allay pain. The formulations also do not require a trained classical homeopath to do casework diagnostics (costing significant time) to attempt to discover the similimum (remedy most resembling the patient's symptoms) and then attempt to prescribe correct potency, dosage and duration of action. When any of the formulations of the invention is used, no drug individualization using only one drug ingredient per dose for each person as practiced in classical homeopathy is required.